The growing interdisciplinarity of research and teaching in the College of Arts and Sciences has created situations where faculty find themselves professionally involved in more than one department or program or even school. This policy seeks to encourage these developments by clarifying the conditions of such appointments.
In practice, joint appointments in the College have been handled in a wide variety of ways. Faculty members with joint appointments variously divide their tenure, FTEs and teaching responsibilities among two or more units, and the extent of their participation in a unit's faculty governance processes also varies. This policy intends to preserve that flexibility and diversity, while at the same time outlining the responsibilities and obligations of units with jointly-appointed faculty. In addition, the policy respects all rules governing academic appointments found in the IUB Academic Guide and the IU Academic Handbook, and offers additional details on issues where those rules are silent. Finally, the policy applies to joint appointments involving units within the College of Arts and Sciences, and serves as a model for joint appointments involving the College and other schools.
The conditions of a joint appointment will be described in a Memorandum of Agreement drawn up by the constituent parties, in consultation with the Dean's office. This Memorandum of Agreement must be approved and signed by the chairs and directors of the involved units, the faculty member, the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and the Dean of the Faculties--before a joint appointment takes effect. The Memorandum of Agreement describes the expectations for the faculty member at the time of initial appointment and is binding for the duration of the faculty member's employment at IU; details may be changed with the approval of all parties listed above.
Under review of the Dean of the College, the Memorandum of Agreement for joint appointments will stipulate the percentage of FTE in each unit, and will consider at least the following other issues:
- One College department will be identified as the faculty member's home unit for purposes of annual reviews, reappointment, promotion and tenure decisions. These processes will be governed by the written procedures of the home unit. The participation of other units involved in the joint appointment will be clearly described, with the chair or director of the non-home unit preparing a recommendation and summary evaluation of research, teaching and service for inclusion in the faculty member's reappointment, tenure and promotion dossier. Any review must assess the faculty member's research, teaching and service contribution to all units involved in the joint appointment.
- The chairs and directors of constituent units must confer at least annually to coordinate teaching and service responsibilities of jointly-appointed faculty. It is important to insure that the overall load of teaching and service obligations does not exceed that of comparable faculty with appointments wholly in one unit.
- Faculty members must submit a Faculty Summary Report to the chairs and directors of all units involved in a joint appointment. Each chair or director must provide the Dean's office with summary comments on the Report.
- Procedures for setting annual salary increments will be determined by a faculty member's percentage of FTE in each constituent unit. For example, for a faculty member with a 0.5 FTE in two units, each unit will receive 50% of the incremental salary funds that are attributed to her base salary.
- Authority to grant requests for various types of leave rests with the Dean of the College and the Dean of the Faculties. For faculty members with joint appointments, chairs and directors of all units involved with the appointment will provide assessments of the requested leave before the deans make a decision.
- Jointly-appointed faculty will have full voting rights in their home unit, regardless of the percentage of FTE in that unit. Voting rights of jointly-appointed faculty in units other than the home unit will be decided upon by the departments and programs involved, and these will be clearly stated in each unit's governance documents. All units involved in joint appointments must decide both the criteria for extending voting rights to such faculty, and the substantive issues on which jointly-appointed faculty would be entitled to vote (for example, personnel decisions, curricular decisions, allocations of unit resources, etc.). Units must assign voting rights to all jointly-appointed faculty in a uniform manner.